Tag Archives: 1989

Remember, remember!
The sixth of December,
The girls in Montreal were shot;
I know of no reason
Why Lepine’s open season
Should ever be forgot!
Young Gharbi with his rifles
Did the scheme contrive
To kill the feminist women,
Make them all die.
“Misogyny!” Media blows.
“Guns are all evil, don’t ya know?”
Good men fought, but they were no match
For the agenda to be dispatched!
Victims were martyred
Illness ignored
“If you won’t give your gun,
We’ll take two,
The better for all,
And the worse for you!”
A rope, a rope to hang Scapegoat,
A gun was the cause of this crime,
A hatred of women is fine,
Talk of mental illness is lies!
Holloa, girls! Holloa, girls! Blame the guns now!
Holloa, girls! Holloa, girls! Take them all now!
Hip, hip, hooor-r-r-ray!

For the last couple of years, I’ve wanted to write a blog about Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot. I always seem to get bogged down in November and miss it though, only coming up for air about this time of year when the Ecole Polytechnique furor picks up. So, this year, I decided to combine the two. The above poem is my ode to Dec 6, set to the metre of Remember, Remember 😛

With the recent abolition of the long gun registry, I expected the Dec 6 hullabaloo to be a bit more chaotic than usual this year. Surprisingly, it has been quite tame so far. I’m not naive enough to think we’ve heard the last of it though.

The fourteen victims of Marc Lepine/Gamil Gharbi were killed on Dec 6, 1989 and their memories have been butchered all over again every Dec 6 since that date. Rather than using their deaths as a launching point to bring awareness to mental health issues and violence against all people, a handful of Feminazi activitists chose to turn those tragic deaths into a pulpit for gun control and violence against women. In a stroke, these misguided people drove an irreparable wedge between the sexes and alienated several million honest gun owning Canadians. Each year, vigils and forums are held to discuss violence against women. No doubt this is a worthy cause, but it’s irrelevant to the date. Yes, only women were killed that day, and yes, Lepine spoke openly about his anti-women beliefs. However, he could just as easily have fixated upon men, or children, or dogs. It just so happens that his mental illness manifested against women.

That’s why the memorials on this day are so out of touch with the reality of what happened in 1989. Where are the focus groups and discussions on mental health? Where is the funding for community health groups that could have helped Marc Lepine before he went on his ramapage?

Every year that we continue to focus on Marc Lepine’s victims rather than on the cause of his actions, is another year that the deaths of those women continue to have been in vain. Yes, there are still gender issues that need addressing, but Dec 6 is not, and never was about feminism or misogyny. Dec 6 is, and always has been, about mental illness.

When are we going to stop dishonouring the victims of Ecole Polytechnique and finally address the real reason that they died?

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the “Montreal Massacre”. On December 6, 1989 Marc Lépine/Gamil Gharbi embarked on a shooting spree at École Polytechnique in Montreal. In twenty minutes, he shot 28 people, killing 14, before turning his gun on himself.

Tragedies of this sort are extremely rare in Canada. Since 1975, when the first recorded shooting took place, there have been only 8 school shootings in this country. The École Polytechnique shooting claimed more lives than all of the other shootings combined.

The real tragedy though, is the way that left-wing fringe groups continue to use the events of that day for their own purposes. While I don’t agree with them, I can understand why the founders of the Coalition for Gun Control reacted as they did in the immediate aftermath of the shooting – the CGC was co-founded by Wendy Cukier and Heidi Rathjen, who was present at École Polytechnique the day of the shooting.

What I can’t understand or condone is how they justify their actions now, twenty years after the fact. Every year, militant feminist groups and gun control advocates brazenly disinter the victims, parading their ghosts before the public in a thinly veiled attempt to manipulate and shame people into supporting their cause.

The shooting at École Polytechnique was unique because the gunman specifically targetted women for the purpose of “fighting feminism”. Much discussion has taken place over the last two decades as to what motivated Marc Lépine/Gamil Gharbi. Some point to his upbringing with a mysoginist father, others say he suffered brain damage due to abuse, but the most commonly trumpeted response is that he was representative of wider societal violence against women.

It is this thinking that has led extremist feminist groups to hijack the anniversary of that day to shamelessly use it for their own ends. Rather than seeking real solutions to violence in our society and the causes of domestic abuse, they instead sully the memory of those who died in order to promote their own brand of misandry.

Approximately 70 women are killed as a result of domestic violence each year. Since 1989, that’s roughly 1400 women who have lost their lives. If these organizations claiming to be for the advancement of women’s rights were truly interested in preventing violence against women, you’d think they would be focussing on the 1400, rather than the 14.

There’s a very simple reason why these groups focus on the 14 though: it’s easier. Concentrating on the 1400 would require them to look for real solutions to complicated and deeply rooted problems in our society. By making a lot of noise and focussing on the gun control legislation that sprang from this tragedy, they can go to bed at night content that they’ve “done something” to prevent violence against women. It doesn’t matter that it doesn’t work.

This year, when the Gun Control Lobby and the extremist feminist groups dishonour the victims of École Polytechnique, which they’ve already started, take a moment to remember that the women who lost their lives that day were people, not symbols. See the organizations who debase the memory of these women for what they really are: a group of angry, scared and grieving people who would rather blame men and guns for all of their problems than tackle the real issues.